Varsity – Olivia Halsall
“Everyone’s account of learning foreign languages is unique. I started Chinese Mandarin ab initio for my undergraduate degree, alongside maintaining French. I’m hoping to pick up Spanish this year, and either Arabic or Hebrew once I’ve graduated. Sounds impressive? It’s not. Foreign languages require daily maintenance, drive and commitment. Spending time in a country that speaks your target language is, in my view, compulsory. My undergraduate degree saw me spend a year as an exchange student in Beijing. Slowly but surely, I would pick up certain mannerisms by observing the way the language manifested itself into people’s behaviour. Instead of talking about the weather, I would talk about food. I stopped saying please, thank you and sorry as much. The way I talked became more direct.” (more)